Star Trek Motion Pictures Ranked
1. Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country
A+ (100)
The dinner scene is one of my favorite scenes in all of film and I could watch the movie on repeat throughout the day.
2. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
A+ (100)
A showdown between Kirk and one of the best and most memorable villains in Star Trek history. Khan!
3. Star Trek: First Contact
A (90)
The Earth scenes are slow and the opening is a little sketchy, but First Contact is easily the best of the Next Generation movies.
4. Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
B (85)
A funny, quality escapist movie that looks even better compared to its immediate predecessor.
5. Star Trek: The Motion Picture
C (75)
Some people love this movie; I thought it was a slog and trying to rip off 2001: A Space Odyssey in parts.
6. Star Trek: Generations
C (75)
A mediocre-at-best movie that should have been much better given that it had both Kirk and Picard.
7. Star Trek: Nemesis
C- (70)
A surprisingly bad final movie for the Next Generation crew.
8. Star Trek: Insurrection
D+ (68)
Lame story and played like an extended episode.
9. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier
D (65)
Not the abject failure many made it out to be, but not a good one.
10. Star Trek III: The Search for Spock
D (65)
Terrible acting where retakes were obviously needed, and a dubious story make this the worst on the list.
Notes:
1. Most people, both normies and Trekkers, would probably put The Wrath of Khan as number 1. I felt Star Trek VI was brilliantly done and it’s definitely my favorite. Both were written and directed by Nicholas Meyer, who also directed 1979’s Time after Time and 1983’s television movie The Day After, both quality movies.
2. Because I was a big fan of the Star Trek movies and Next Generation show, I don’t have a rewatchability breaking point. I would watch all of them again. For normies that aren’t into Star Trek that much, I would recommend the first four movies on the list if interested.
3. Given the large and diverse Star Trek fandom, there is considerable debate surrounding just how good or bad most of the movies are. This is especially true for the bottom six on my list. For example, some people feel Generations and Nemesis are absolutely horrible and after time has passed, put the outright hated Star Trek V before those movies. Another example is that some feel Star Trek III, the worst on my list, has gotten better with age.
4. As much as I didn’t like Star Trek III, it’s not a dismal failure. It is the middle movie of the three movie story arc of II through IV and does an adequate job of bridging the gap between II and IV. I always feel bringing back characters who died is lame, though, and that’s no exception with bringing back Spock.
5. The Next Generation movies are plagued by attempts at more action rather than science fiction. The only one to pull that off successfully is First Contact. While I have Generations as a mediocre C, it looks exceptionally bad when compared to Next Generation’s season finale All Good Things…, which was written and filmed around the same exact time as Generations. All Good Things… will likely appear high on a future list of top ten Next Generation episodes list that I make.
6. I’ve got Nemesis as a C-, but I understand the hatred for this movie. Picard was completely out of character and it ripped off previous Star Trek movies. As an action movie, it’s not terrible, though. Its biggest sin is being the first even numbered movie to be truly bad. After Star Trek IV came out, it was noted by most Trekkers that the odd numbered movies were bad and the even numbered movies were good. I felt this pattern generally continued right up until Nemesis (basically Star Trek X) when Nemesis was bad making for six bad movies and four good ones. It should have been five and five and it killed the Next Generation movie franchise at the same time.
7. I’ve seen the newer J. J. Abrams Star Trek movies but didn’t list them as they are more of a reboot. I felt Star Trek in 2009 was decent, Into Darkness was bad, and I liked Beyond the most of the three despite one of the worst initial trailers for a movie I have ever seen.
